Student project could give UK athletes an Olympic edge
COMPUTER games students from Sheffield Hallam University have won £25,000 in a prestigious competition to develop innovative concepts for the nation’s elite athletes.
UK Sport believe the students’ project has so much potential to give Britain’s Olympic athletes an edge that they have classified it ‘top secret’.
Varun Kadle, SM Imran HZ, Shanaka Senevirathne and Mangala Kodagoda won the top prize to continue their research project for UK Sport’s 2009 Ideas4innovation New Researchers Award.
The New Researchers Award is aimed at final year and first year post graduate students with creative ideas that may have the potential to enhance the performance of British Olympic or Paralympic athletes.
Prof Steve Haake, head of sports engineering at Sheffield Hallam, said: “The students were very quick to pick up on the needs of the sport.
“They worked fantastically as a team, with two programmers and two animators producing a really polished piece of software. It obviously worked because not only did they get to the final but they won.”
Varun Kadle said: “It is truly an honour to be recognised by Britain’s elite sports governing organisation. This is the perfect reward for the team’s hard work. I am very glad that the work and dedication of each team member has paid off so well.
“I hope that this project will eventually act as a very valuable tool which can help the athletes achieve laurels. Receiving this grant has opened up new avenues and given the team enough support to make this a world class product.”
A total of 18 projects were submitted to UK Sport from final year undergraduate or masters-level students in the disciplines of engineering, science, medicine or the arts.
Eight finalists were chosen to present their projects to an expert panel at UK Sport’s Head Office in London.
The successful project was based on the development of a novel tool to assist athletes in their preparation for performing at, and insight of, competition venues.
It provides a means for the athletes to familiarise themselves with their competition arena and all visual cues to assist strategy prior to any competitive race.
